The author is a Forbes contributor. The opinions expressed are those of the writer.

Loading ...

Loading ...

This story appears in the {{article.article.magazine.pretty_date}} issue of {{article.article.magazine.pubName}}. Subscribe

Image by AFP/Getty Images via @daylife

As Americans race off to enjoy this weekend's Independence Day festivities, whether this was or remains an exceptional country has become a defining question for our times. Dueling worldviews compete to define our past so to steer our future.

Our own president, the manifestation of political correctness, traipses around the world apologizing for the country that so favored him. He famously mocked the idea of American exceptionalism, deriding her as indistinct from Britain or Greece. Before we decline a la Greece, we ought to think back to what made this nation transcendent.

On one side my ancestors helped hack a great nation out of vast, mostly uninhabited wilderness. The other side sailed here fleeing feudal oppression. Both families came seeking better lives. It wasn't easy. My mother's ancestors braved rough seas, hostile Indians and the great unknown.

My father's came to a strange land with a different language, culture and customs. None were promised a Rose Garden. By sweat, blood and tears they made the better lives they sought. Most Americans' ancestry reveals similar hardships and successes.

Only in a free society embodying markets and respecting property rights is this possible. While some had more than others and some had more options, most were free to pursue what happiness they sought. In the societies they left, choices were restricted, dreams stunted and the material benefits limited. Freedom and prosperity are inexorably linked.

Freedom wasn't perfect here, but unlike the preponderance of world history, freedom abounded. America has seemingly forgotten what made her a beacon to the world. We downplay this bold experiment in favor of overblown tales of oppression. In the revision, America wasn't unique because of its unprecedented liberty and resultant prosperity. According to cultural elitists, America was singularly vile for exploiting workers, enslaving blacks, robbing Indians and oppressing women.

As previously highlighted on Forbes, this reflects blatant cultural Marxism. Historically, few Americans found class antagonisms convincing. The Left substituted race, sex and other factors for the class conflict of orthodox Marxism. Under the guise of diversity, the Left seeks ideological uniformity uniting assorted grievance bearers in collective resentment against America's cultural heritage.

Today our children are indoctrinated into perverse revisionism. Schools harp more on the KKK, slavery and Jim Crow than extol the heroism and unrivaled restraint of George Washington, the inventive genius of Thomas Edison or the innovative business acumen of Henry Ford. Our young know plenty about America's perceived national sins, but little of her astounding achievements.

In an Orwellian redefinition of virtue, those who love America are smeared as intolerant bigots while those degrading the culture which sustains them pass as caring and compassionate. Most Americans intuitively perceive the hypocrisy of politically correct dogma, but few dare articulate their dismay, cowed into obsequiousness by the ubiquitous thought police.